rec.arts.comics.creative Frequently Asked Questions

Maintained by Russ Allbery <eagle@eyrie.org>
Original by Jeff McCoskey
Last modified August 3, 2014

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Welcome to rec.arts.comics.creative, the newsgroup which could have been
named rec.prose.shared-universe but wasn't, the newsgroup which has, to
date, produced well over 30MB of entirely free original fiction (and
that's compressed!), the newsgroup which has nearly nothing to do with
your favorite comic books at all!

You're about to go insane. Don't worry, it's fun.

rec.arts.comics.creative (henceforth RACC) is a moderated newsgroup for
comics-related original fiction and discussion of same, originally created
unmoderated by Martin Phipps and a cast of thousands (well, dozens at
least) and later converted to moderated to keep out the spam. Don't
worry, even though it's a moderated group, it's still friendly, chatty,
and not at all formal, and we go out of our way to keep it that way.

The first group of this sort on the Internet was the Superguy mailing
list, which is still in operation to this day (you'll see posts from it on
this group from time to time). Later, the Legion of Net.Heroes (LNH)
sprung out of a free-form thread on rec.arts.comics and spawned another
newsgroup (alt.comics.lnh). They were quickly followed by a wide variety
of other comics-based shared universes, including the Patrol, the
Net.Trenchcoat.Brigade, and Omega. All of these organizations, in
parallel, gathered together authors in shared universes and strongly
influenced the nature of RACC.

First and foremost, RACC is a site for people to post comics-related
fiction. Stories about long-underwear vigilantes, anthropomorphic
animals, SF, westerns, even Kleen Teens if anyone is so moved. As long as
it relates to comics it's okay. So whether you're a reader, a writer, or
that fabled creature the critic, or even all three -- welcome to RACC:
it's all the story, none of the art! (yet)

For the official charter, see section 1.3. Here's the long, readable
version.

One term that you'll see a lot is "shared universe." This is a shared
story background, co-created by multiple authors and used as the
"universe" in which multiple different stories are set. This is a
trademark characteristic of most comic books (seen in its clearest form in
the ubiquitous crossover, a story written by multiple authors at once and
involving multiple characters who all have their own stories), as well as
appearing in some other published fiction (such as Wild Cards, or Larry
Niven's Man-Kzin Wars). Most (but not all) of the stories posted here
take place in one of the established shared universes (there's a list
later on in this FAQ), to the point where this style of writing is nearly
characteristic of the group.

Another term you'll see is "comics-related." Nearly all of the authors
writing here drew their original (if not primary) inspiration from comic
books. As a result, nearly all of the stories are on-going (published a
chapter at a time), divided up into "issues" and given numbers, and
organized into "imprints." Many people also describe covers or design
ASCII graphic logos.

There is no restriction on types of fiction. (That'd kinda take the
creative out of RACC, wouldn't it?) You'll see stories run the gamut from
slapstick comedy to grim'n'gritty Real Life Supers (TM). As long as it's
about comics, set your pen free. (You'll see a lot of superhero fiction,
but that just means that those of us who like reading other things as well
are anxiously awaiting your non-superhero stories.)

RACC is also for discussion of stories, both specific ones and in general.
The critic and reader is one of the most sought-after types of people
around here; if you give us feedback on our stories, good or bad, we'll
love you forever.

Finally, if you want to announce your free web strip here, we welcome
those posts too. If you're trying to sell it, though, please try
rec.arts.comics.marketplace or rec.arts.comics.strips instead. (And
rec.arts.comics.strips may be a better group in general, as RACC readers
are mostly interested in text fiction.)

This newsgroup welcomes any form of comics-related original fiction and
discussion of the same, including but not limited to stories in the many
established shared universes. Discussion of on-line fiction as a whole is
also welcome provided that it is related to the stories on the newsgroup.
If they choose to write in an existing shared universe, writers are
strongly encouranged to follow the existing continuity and rules of that
universe. "Comics-related" will be interpreted very broadly, as has been
traditional on the newsgroup.

Each posting to rec.arts.comics.creative should include a keyword on the
subject line either designating which shared universe the posting refers
to or marking the general subject of the post (ADMIN, META, MISC, etc.).
If a submitted post does not have a keyword, the moderator will add an
appropriate keyword, but posters are encouraged to add keywords themselves
to save moderation work.

Large binaries, such as artwork, will not be allowed on the newsgroup.
Instead, binaries can be made available in the newsgroup archive (subject
to the discretion of the archivist) and a pointer posted to the newsgroup.
Pointers to Web pages are also welcome, provided the content of the page
is related to the purpose of the group.

Stories using copyrighted or trademarked characters are explicitly not
within the charter of this group and may be rejected unless the author
owns the copyrights and trademarks or has written permission from the
owner. Networking posts (artists seeking writers or writers seeking
artists) are inappropriate in this group and should be sent to appropriate
mailing lists or other groups in the rec.arts.comics.* hierarchy
(rec.arts.comics.misc if there is no other more appropriate group).

This is very important, so I'm going to yell it. RACC IS NOT THE PLACE
FOR FICTION ABOUT ESTABLISHED, TRADEMARKED CHARACTERS. This includes all
Marvel, Image, DC, what-have-you characters. RACC's charter expressly
FORBIDS such fiction.

The reason for this is the ongoing legislative battles about intellectual
property and the Net. rec.* groups are picked up worldwide, and sysadmins
do not want to draw lawsuits because someone wrote a story that violated
trademark laws. Note that fanfic stories may or may not be lawful and/or
prosecutable, WE JUST DON'T KNOW. They're still writing the laws.

To forestall any confusion or debates, and to protect sysadmins from
inadvertently becoming the test case, this provision was adopted as a key
requirement for RACC's creation. If you really must write about existing,
trademarked characters, there is alt.comics.fan-fiction waiting to receive
you. alt.* groups get picked up by sysadmins voluntarily, so they
presumedly know what risks they're taking.

Nothing will draw this group's ire faster than violating this requirement.

Thanks to the tireless efforts and bottomless disk space of Russ Allbery,
all stories posted to rec.arts.comics.creative are archived! This means
stories will be preserved for future generations of readers, providing a
link to the past. It is difficult to over-praise this contribution.

(Note: Lest you think I would be so crass as to praise myself, I want to
make sure you know that Jeff wrote that last paragraph. 'course, I didn't
delete it either.)

The archive site is ftp.eyrie.org in the directory /pub/racc; you can
browse through the archives either by connecting to it via anonymous ftp
or by pointing your web browser at either of:

in the form of a more traditional mailing list archive, so you can also
look there if a story hasn't been saved in the story archive. This is the
best way to find anything posted in the last few years. You can search
the archive by prepending "site:lists.eyrie.org" to a regular Google
search.

Please note that stories will be removed from both the list archive and
the story archive at the author's request if the author wants to take them
down. This has happened in the past, sometimes because the author wanted
to sell the stories to a professional venue.

Everything that shows up in RACC also shows up in its associated mailing
list (and vice versa), so if you want to be sure not to miss anything, or
if you just prefer e-mail to Usenet, you can subscribe to that mailing
list.

This assumes you want to create your own universe to write in. If you
want to join a pre-existing shared universe, it's a little more involved.

Many of the imprints have FAQs of their own (OMEGA, Superguy, LNH,
Crossroads to name a few). These get posted periodically. The first
thing you should do is read these documents to get a feel for what these
specific universes are like.

The next thing you should do is _read_ the universe in question. This
includes tapping the archives for back issues. No one would suggest you
read the entire Superguy or LNH archives before writing, but definitely
try to sample a large cross-section.

Lastly, email some of the creators you see writing under a specific
imprint. They will be able to tell you if your concept fits with their
universe or not, and perhaps refer you to a more appropriate universe if
necessary.

RACC is a moderated newsgroup, which means that every post goes to the
moderators first. If your site correctly has the group marked as
moderated, you should be able to post just like you post to any other
group and your news server will take care of the rest. If you have a Unix
shell account, you can check if the group is correctly marked as moderated
by typing:

nntplist active | grep rec.arts.comics.creative

If the last character on the resulting line is an "m," congratulations,
you have a good news administrator. If it's a "y," send mail to your
local computing support people and ask them to convert the group to
moderated like it should be.

If you don't have a Unix shell account, some newsreaders will also tell
you if the group is moderated.

If, for any reason, you have trouble posting or your site doesn't have
the group marked as moderated, you can mail your post to racc@eyrie.org
instead and it will be posted for you.

Because the group is moderated, it can be up to a day after you post
before your article is actually posted, and it can take a few more days
for the article to propagate back to you. So don't be surprised if it
doesn't show up right away.

Many readers of rec.arts.comics.creative use Google Groups to read and
post. While this works, and I know it's convenient, Google Groups also
deletes anything enclosed in square brackets ([]) at the beginning of
Subject lines in replies. If you use Google Groups, please try to
remember to put back the imprint tags when you reply to posts; otherwise,
I have to add them as the moderator.

Formatting is pretty loose. Since this is a comics newsgroup, you will
hear people refer to their stories as "issues." Postings tend to run in
numerical order just like comic books, and many people write continuing
series. For example there are 25 "issues" in Drizzt's _Continuity Champ
and the Drizzt's Defenders_ series.

Stories don't have to be series though. One-shots, mini-series,
maxi-series, crossovers -- all of these have been done before and will be
done again.

The subjects of postings should follow the convention of naming the
imprint the title and the number. For example:

Since the archive mechanism relies heavily on this format (not to mention
the format-accustomed eyes of this group's readers), please follow this
strictly, including the use of the #-sign. Subtitles, alternate titles,
and title comments should follow the number if they are used at all. If
you want to, you can use [TAG] instead of TAG: at the beginning of the
subject; it's all the same to the archiver. (TAG: causes a few fewer
problems than [TAG] with Google Groups.)

Occasionally, instead of (or in addition to) a number you will see "TEB."
This stands for "Trade EtherBack." It means the posting is actually a
collection of previously posted issues -- usually cleaned up and relating
to a single story arc.

Inside your story do what you will. Some folks run fake ads, others use
cheesy ASCII graphics, some just use text. A word of advice: On
older/more primitive newsreaders your text is MUCH easier to read if you
space between paragraphs. On the other hand, some newer newsreader
readers find the spaces jarring. The moral? You can't please all the
people all the time. In general spaces seem to be more preferred.

In order to accommodate a near-infinite number of different potential
universes, RACC has adopted the reasonable convention of flagging fiction.
This allows uninterested parties to skip some genres, and others to
quickly find their niches of interest. The flag goes before the title of
story issues, related FAQs or universe-specific discussions. Many flags
refer to existing shared-universes. New ones will come up all the time.
For the current list, see section 5 of this FAQ.

Once you pick an imprint name, stick with it. The Archive and your legion
of new fans will both be happier if you don't make marketing name changes.

Regardless of flags all SEXUALLY EXPLICIT or PROFANITY-RICH stories should
have huge warning labels at the beginning of text. Last thing we need is
a Florida DA bringing us all up on charges. ;] Besides, it's only common
courtesy. Note that if a story could reasonably be posted on
alt.sex.stories, you've probably strayed a bit far from this group's
interests.

Some sort of flag, either an imprint name or a more general tag, is
required on all posts and one will be added by the moderator if you don't
provide one. Leaving one off requires the moderator to edit your post,
though, which takes time and means your post will be delayed. So please
save them the trouble and remember to add the tag yourself.

Good news! It's already being done for you! (Or at least it will be if
Russ ever catches up with the archiving.)

In theory, every story posted to rec.arts.comics.creative is archived at
<http://archives.eyrie.org/racc/>. Most imprints have their own
directories, with the stories stored in directories under that (depending
on the size of the imprint, the directories could be very structured or
just one directory for each series). Some imprints may be collected in
the misc directory.

Unfortunately, this archive is substantially out of date. Russ hopes to
eventually find time to update it.

The exception is Superguy, which has its own archiving mechanism. The
Superguy archives are at ftp.eyrie.org under /pub/superguy, but one of the
best ways to access them is through the Autocollector at:

I don't even play a lawyer on TV, but there are some things you should
know about Copyright laws.

Anything you write is copyrighted immediately, whether you flag it with a
copyright notice or not. Furthermore, the copyright protection is
international under the Berne Copyright Convention, which has been signed
by nearly every country with access to Usenet.

If you label your text as copyrighted, it preempts a possible
"unintentional infringement" defense from plagarizers. The copyright
notice is considered legal notice that you intend to retain your rights.
The legal format for such a notice requires three things: Your name, the
year, and one or more of the following: "Copyright," "Copr.," and/or the
c-in-circle symbol. Note that there is no firm legal precedence for (C)
or (c) as having any special copyright meaning. Example notice:

Copyright 1994 Jeff J McCoskey

The only way to get full legal protection (at least in the United States)
is to register your work with the government (forms are free, filing fees
apply). This guarantees an archived, dated copy should future legal
action be necessary. Other forms of dating, like mailing yourself a copy
or archiving (to get a date stamp), are of dubious and unproven legal
value.

An excellent resource for Copyright information is misc.legal, where a FAQ
is posted monthly.

As a rule of thumb, everything you've heard elsewhere about good
netiquette applies here. We hate spammers (more in a minute), expect
smilies when joking (except in stories of course), and in general expect
you to conduct yourselves as good net.citizens. There are three things
you need to know after you've mastered Basic Netiquette:

The only times flames are accepted on RACC are when they are both
morally defensible and amusing. Flames are not welcome if they do not
meet the above criteria. Here on RACC there is one organization that
acts as moral compass for acceptable flames: the Order of St. Doomas.

The Order has defined one activity that is worthy of flame: spamming.
One member of the Order (usually the first to his/her keyboard) will
have the honors. Repetitive flaming by multiple members is frowned
upon by the Order.

To join this righteous crusade, all you need do is select a
net.persona and flame. Incorrect flaming (i.e. at non-sanctioned
targets, or with unamusing effect) will result in ostracization and
excommunication. Watch the Order in action before joining and all
will be clear.

Now that the group has been moderated, most opportunities for flames
are gone. But watch carefully; new ones may arise.

Reviews of stories (even negative ones) are one of the most
sought-after commodities on RACC. You will instantly win friends and
influence people if you post reviews. But especially in the case of
negative reviews, ensure you confine your review to the story and not
the writer. Keep in mind as you write "that SUCKS" that someone
worked long and hard on the text. They might want to know what worked
and what didn't in their narrative but it's doubtful they want to hear
how clever you can be in ripping them up.

It's certain the rest of us don't.

One of the best features of a shared universe is the opportunity to
have your characters interact with others in that universe. This is
a privilege, not a right. All characters on RACC (and their
distinctive text-likenesses) are the full and exclusive property of
their creators. This is not as dogmatic as it sounds, and we're all
adults (or pretending to be). Cameos (non-speaking/non-plot affecting
roles) do not typically require permission unless the creator desires
it. Speaking roles should be previewed through email and approved by
the creator before being posted.

These are terms you will see come up on RACC that have special meaning
here. (For general net.terms and abbreviations, see the META RAC FAQ.)

Acraphobe RACC's version of adult warning label. Yes, with an "a."
Don't ask.

Arc A multi-issue storyline.

Archive ftp.eyrie.org, where nearly ALL the back issues live.

Crossover A storyline that involves several titles and/or authors. Also
the bane of all mankind.

Elsewhirls An imaginary story. (Yeah yeah, we know they're ALL
imaginary. How about "out-of-continuity"?)

Fanfiction Fiction about established, trademarked universes and
or fanfic characters that the author did not create -- in short, the
sort of stories RACC *wasn't* designed for. There's a good
list of newsgroups at the end of this FAQ that should help in
finding a better group if this is what you want to write.

Imprint The shared universe your story takes place in or subject your
posting relates to (we have many to chose from). This is
usually an all-caps prefix on the title of the posting.

LNH The Legion of Net.Heroes. The immediate father of this group
and the oldest of the Usenet-based writing universes (see
Superguy).

RAC* The rec.arts.comics.* hierarchy of newsgroups.

RACC rec.arts.comics.creative. You're soaking in it!

rACCIES The annual RACC fanfiction awards, as voted on by the readers
or RACCies of this newsgroup.

Repost Story has been posted before, natch.

Superguy A mailing list that predates all other Internet comics-fiction
forums. There is a good-natured rivalry between the LNH and
this group.

TEB Trade EtherBack. This is a collection of previously posted
material, usually cleaned up and relating to a single story
arc.

Title A numerically increasing, continuing series. Usually
involving one character, cast, city, or unifying concept.

When choosing a tag to put at the beginning of your post, this list should
be a canonical reference. If you see a need for a new tag, send mail to
the FAQ maintainer so that it can be added.

First, the general tags:

ADMIN Administrative matters affecting everyone on RACC.

FAQ FAQs of note for the entire RAC* hierarchy. These will tend
to be crossposted here.

META Discussion about the newsgroup itself. This includes
or CHAT everything from general discussion of on-line fiction and RACC
in particular to recommendations on how long posts should be.

PRECOG Announcements of upcoming series, planned stories, and the
or PROMO like.

WWW Announcement of a web page related to RACC or a free strip.

Now, all of the writing imprints. Note that new ones of these pop up all
the time. Entries marked with (*) are in danger of being retired due to
lack of activity. If you have any changes, please mail eagle@eyrie.org.

8FOLD A closed universe that encompasses serious superheroes, comedy,
memoir, and just about anything else: high-quality fiction of
any stripe is welcome.

ACRAPHOBE Mature stories that may or may not fit into other universes'
or ACRA continuity. Using this flag in conjunction with another is
not unheard of. (For example, Scav's _501 Blues_ is
LNH/ACRAPHOBE.) Think a meta-Vertigo.

ELSEWHIRLS LNH stories that do not fit into LNH continuity. Think DC's
or EW Elseworlds.

HCC The High Concept Challenge, a continuous series of writing
contests. Each round, the winner, chosen by reader vote, gets
to pick the next round's concept.

LNH Legion of Net.Heroes, "The Friendliest Shared Universe
Going!(TM)" A mostly parody universe, though it does have its
serious side.

LNH20 On the LNH's 20th anniversary, a group of writers took it upon
themselves to create a new world, based in everything they
loved about the LNH, in the best spirit of comic book reboots!
LNH20 is just as friendly as the original, but easier to get
into! Hop right in, the adventure's fine!

LNHY An Imprint involving an alternate LNH universe called
Looniverse Y. The big difference between this and the Classic
LNH is that writers are allowed to have only one character of
theirs in this Looniverse's LNH.

RACCCafe A continuity-free outpust where RACC characters can unwind
after a hard day of being mangled by their writers. Anything
can happen, as long as it's funny, and there are no
consequences!

SG Superguy. From Space Moose to the Bomb. Comedy superhero
writing with a far different background than LNH. Note that
only a small slice of Superguy stuff appears here; to see the
rest, go to <http://lists.eyrie.org/mailman/listinfo/superguy>.

STARFALL Lightly serious and seriously light superheroics, and better
because of it. ;)

NTB Net.Trenchcoat.Brigade. A bunch of Vertigo-like characters
that own stock in London Fog. Not tremendously active, but
they do have a considerable history. Implied Acraphobe.

OMEGA A serious psi-based shared super-world and once upon a time
RACC's third largest universe, now inactive. Created by the
legendary Matt Rossi.

OSD The Order of Saint Doomas. Items relating to RACC's anti-spam
cult. (See Section 3 above.) No posts have been seen from
this imprint in quite some time, but that doesn't mean they're
gone....

SW10 SW stands for Superhuman World. 10 is an annual tag. The
comic has proceeded to 2011, but the tag has frozen at 2010
because that's when the series really interacted with RACC.
Scott Eiler has written the story of this universe since
before 1991, but 1991 is when the modern heroes of this series
start. His sources include adolescent male power fantasy,
superhero role-playing, comic-book satire, and dreams. See
<http://www.eilertech.com/stories/>.

MISC Stories not in the above categories or in their own universes
(authors are encouraged to make up their own headers as well).
To limit the number of imprints, and to keep this FAQ to
reasonable lengths, let's adopt this convention: One-shot
stories or series should use the MISC flag. Series that set
up shared universes should create their own, new imprint.

The major header contacts are listed below, who will be glad to answer
email question. Also keep your eyes peeled for FAQs specific to
particular imprints. The FAQs are also often in the archive in a
directory named "FAQs" under the imprint directory.